


Be

by ChokolatteJedi



Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Challenge Response, Community: 1-million-words, Community: tv-universe, Coping, Gen, Introspection, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-15
Updated: 2013-11-15
Packaged: 2018-01-01 18:42:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 345
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1047287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChokolatteJedi/pseuds/ChokolatteJedi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Radar has a question for Hawkeye</p>
            </blockquote>





	Be

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the1MW prompt, "Exalt" and the TV-Universe Quote challenge with the quote:
> 
> "If you want to be happy, be."  
> — Leo Tolstoy

"Hawkeye, how come you're so happy all the time?" Radar asked one day as he handed out coffee in the scrub room.

Hawkeye stared at him in silence for a moment, but the young boy was completely serious. Hawkeye had been completely miserable and bitching about it for three months solid since coming to Korea. He did his job and then drowned his sorrows as soon as the patients were out of his hands. He cracked lewd jokes and tried to lose himself in any warm body he could find. He was coming apart at the seams, and in his mind that should be blatantly obvious to everyone who crossed his path.

And yet here was this child - this baby - looking at him and asking how he stayed happy? "What?" he finally said.

"Well, you know, you're always joking at stuff!" Radar replied cheerfully, handing him a cup off of his tray. "You're always smiling, and making the patients laugh. How do you stay so happy?"

Again, Hawkeye found himself at a loss for words. Sarcasm was not happiness, and Hawkeye had never claimed it was. If he had to pick a contestant for most cheerful person in camp - that he didn't want to smother with a pillow - he would have probably picked Radar. How on earth could the kid view him as a model of sanity and happiness? As someone to exalt?

Hawkeye opened his mouth to brush Radar off, maybe tell some kind of joke, but a flash of memory from an English Lit class popped into his head. "Well, Radar, I think Leo Tolstoy said it best: 'If you want to be happy, be.' That's what you've got to remember."

"If you want to be happy, be." Radar repeated softly, musing over those words. "Thanks, Hawkeye."

Radar slowly shuffled from the scrub room, apparently seriously contemplating Hawkeye's words. Bemused, Hawkeye watched after him for a moment before turning back to his cold coffee. He had never managed to live by Tolstoy's words, but maybe, in the middle of this hellhole, Radar could.


End file.
